


Qualification

by Anam_Writes



Series: princes love dragons; it's just a fact [6]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Forehead Kisses, Forehead Touching, Post-Time Skip, byleth needs a pep talk, no beta; we die like men, verdant wind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-20
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:09:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23233777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anam_Writes/pseuds/Anam_Writes
Summary: "You fear you are unqualified to be my Commander," it is not a question he has asked.All the same, she nods. "I understand the clout that comes with my name and the position Rhea has put me in but…"She dares not say the rest. Claude wonders at the shame colouring her cheeks, the quiver of her bottom lip. In the months preceding her awakening he'd noticed how drastic the changes were in her expressions - though they seemed subtle to the uninitiated - but this. He had yet to see Byleth so unsure, so fragile.
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan
Series: princes love dragons; it's just a fact [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1610308
Comments: 15
Kudos: 157





	Qualification

**Author's Note:**

> A short from an ask from an anon who is lovely. 
> 
> I have so many WIPs that I'm just glad I could get this one out here. Even if the manner was not timely.

Words are not inherent to her person. Her voice is a tool not often used. Claude can forgive them all for not catching it: the tilt of her body forward in her seat, her hand resting on the edge of the old bishop's table, the gleam in her eyes. Nor can he find fault with their lack of reaction when it goes out.

Claude watches her - shamelessly watches, eyes glued and brow knit - as Lorenz barrels through another monologue. A soliloquy, more like, as the man seems to have no concept of it but he is, indeed, speaking only to himself. 

Byleth has not felt his gaze, or else pretends not to notice it. She sits with her hands folded in her lap, eyes ahead and far off. 

“I think that will be all for today,” Claude raises his hand, interrupting Lorenz mid ramble. “The war council is dismissed.”

The Gloucester Lordling opens his mouth as though to speak before Hilda rushes over, grasping him by the elbow and beginning to chatter away at him. The smile that follows is polite, confused and ultimately fond, on Lorenz’ face. 

Claude will have to thank Hilda for that.

With Lorenz’ apparent assent the room empties quickly. 

Claude thinks Byleth must know he’s been staring; she does not stand to leave and indicate otherwise. 

“You wanted to say something?” Claude asks.

Byleth looked at her hands, still folded like a demure lady’s in her lap. The sight concerned him. 

“It was nothing important,” she tells him. 

He doesn’t buy that for even a second.

Claude stands and the sound of his heavy oak chair scraping against the wood floor as he drags in behind him echoes through the chamber. Byleth looks up at him finally, her eyes wide with that same deer-like shock he’d scene in her when she first returned to him. Before he’d welcomed her home to his side. Before she had smiled. 

Claude turns the chair to face her, sits and tries to look as encouraging as he can. 

“In my experience, your input is the most valuable resource at my disposal,” he says. “That’s far from unimportant, don’t you think?”

Byleth’s eyes flick away. They land on a map of Fódlan just in front of her. There are little painted soldiers to represent their troops, carved out castles half the size of his thumb for their forts and flagged markers for resources. As of now the one if most concern in food. 

There are stores in Garreg Mach, recently replenished with the aid of Lady Daphnel. That is enough for the main body of the Army assembled but the people need feeding just as much. The question was how to redirect food, with how sparse their resources currently were, to the general populace until they could get a hold of the yet inaccessible Gloucester stockpile to the south. And thus the topic of discussion had turned. 

Yet Byleth remained quiet still. She fidgeted, picking at a flake of dry skin at her nail bed. 

"In your experience? You have much of it?" She asks. 

Claude scoffs, "I like to think five years of war and navigating Leicester politics as Sovereign Duke have lent me some experience, my friend."

"And how much input did I give in those five years asleep in a ditch?"

He is surprised at the turn she takes, but not unprepared. "You'd be surprised. After a year under your supervision I'm afraid the little voice in my head sounds quite a bit like you."

She huffs and looks away. 

"By that I mean it's mostly quiet and stares through my soul. But, you know, that speaks volumes."

That manages to get a laugh out of her, though it is quiet and breathy. When she turns back to him her smile is only mild and her eyes deeper than before. Perhaps it is the light reflecting off them at this angle but Claude swears they are dewy with emotion. 

"I am a mercenary, my battle experience limited to skirmishes and basic martial training," she says. "I have no experience in war, or continental conflict, in politics or the logistics of a country's maintenance."

"You fear you are unqualified to be my Commander," it is not a question he has asked. 

All the same, she nods. "I understand the clout that comes with my name and the position Rhea has put me in but…"

She dares not say the rest. Claude wonders at the shame colouring her cheeks, the quiver of her bottom lip. In the months preceding her awakening he'd noticed how drastic the changes were in her expressions - though they seemed subtle to the uninitiated - but this. He had yet to see Byleth so unsure, so fragile. 

Then again, who would not be concerned, fighting the first war to happen on Fódlan soil in 300 years as a newly appointed Commander at the age of twenty-one was a lot for him to ask of her. 

But…

“You were a brilliant strategist when we were both young,” he smiles. “You knew more of battle than colleagues twice your age. I saw you rival your father in combat and we both know, in spite of all his obfuscating, he was old enough to have fought in war before. Perhaps even many wars.”

“That was then,” Byleth says. 

“And are you less skilled a soldier than when you woke?” He asks. “Are you any less intelligent, or disciplined, or magnetic than you were?”

“I am not less, but…” she gestures outwards, to him. “You are more.”

“You made me more,” he says. The reddening of her cheeks is unmistakable. Claude moves to hold the back of her neck, to bring his lips to her forehead so they can kiss her and linger before any more foulness can leave her mouth against her. “We learn from each other; we grow together. So stay with me, won’t you?”

Byleth nods. 

Only then does he pull back from her, when he knows no more insults will whirl in the air between them. 

“I need you,” he reminds her, smiling. His brow rests against hers and she is looking at him with something new in her eyes. “So at least wait until the wars over before you leave me.”

She blinks. “I’ll never leave you. Even if I were as useless as a seamstress in battle I’d never leave you.”

“Shhhhh,” he hushes her. “You could never be.”

The moment extends. Breath mingles and their hands entwine in his lap. Their eyes are closed and their pulses stagger. Claude can feel the sunlight from the window warm his back and the heat of her presence to his front. It’s quiet, gentle, meditative in its nature.

Were it not for Lorenz rushing in he would not think it would end. 

“Ah!” Lorenz clears his throat and rolls his eyes. “I suspected you might have dismissed us just to interrupt. But it would seem you’re toying with young maiden hearts. I overestimated you, it would seem.”

Claude gives a sigh, long and weary, before standing. Byleth’s hand is still in his when he’s at his feet and he wants to grin smugly for that fact alone. 

“What is it, Lorenz?”

“I was wondering, when you have the time - which I know you do - if you could allow me to properly make my case about the food distribution,” he huffed.

Claude glanced back at his friend. Byleth smiled up at him and squeezed his hand. 

“We’re both here now,” Claude said, waving his arm to the seat on his other side. “Make your case, Lorenz. We’ll see if it holds up to Byleth’s scrutiny.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you guys! Would love to hear your thoughts below. Soft Claudeleth is my favourite to write.


End file.
